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We have noticed that of late,
government ministers & officials, and People’s Action Party
members have been criticizing Singaporeans and their attitudes
towards a myriad of issues – from employment to public housing.
We thus would like to collate all
of these into a single thread here.
Our hope is that the government
will see for itself the callous, unfair and condescending attitude
it and its members have adopted towards Singaporeans and do some
soul-searching. Singaporeans work hard, very hard, and gives the
PAP government its vote of confidence at every election since
independence.
Are such remarks towards
Singaporeans justified?
If you come across any such
Singaporeans-bashing remarks, please do email them to us at:
[email protected]
Please read also:
Bashing Singaporeans – PAP gets in on
the act.
We begin with Deputy Prime Minister
Teo Chee Hean’s remarks in the Straits Times on 8 April 2010:
INADEQUATE
“Employees must not
conveniently use the excuse of perceived discriminatory work
practices to cover up their own work inadequacies.”
DPM TEO CHEE HEAN (Straits Times, 8
April 2010, Page A6)
—–
MOLLYCODDLED
“A boy who is mollycoddled
is a very different person from the one who is physically tough and
takes spills without fear and whining.”
MP FOR MARINE PARADE GRC, SAM TAN
(Straits
Times, 25 May 2009)
—–
SLOW
“I think the spurs are not
stuck on your hinds. They are part of the herd,
why-go-faster?”
MM LEE KUAN YEW (National
Geographic, Jan 2010)
——
LESSER MORTALS
“Mr Tan didn’t “brag” about
how expensive the trip was in the article. Maybe it made
lesser mortals envious and they thought maybe he was a bit
boastful.”
MP FOR PASIR-RIS-PUNGGOL CHARLES
CHONG (Jan
2009)
—–
UNREALISTIC
Straits Times, April
2010
—–
NO
SELF-CONFIDENCE
“How can this be? People are
coming to learn from us, see how we teach, why we are successful.
Yet our teachers don’t have self-confidence.”
DPM TEO CHEE HEAN (Straits
Times, April 2010)
—–
IRRATIONAL
“THE Minister in the Prime
Minister’s Office on Sunday acknowledged Singaporeans’ concern over
immigration issues, but urged them to avoid ‘developing irrational
fears’ towards new immigrants.’
Straits Times, April
2010
—–
SENSITIVE
“People are
sensitive.”
DPM TEO CHEE HEAN (CNA,
April 2010)
—–
COMPLACENT
“Complacency sets in when a
people have not suffered any shock or setback for a long time, as
in Singapore without jihadist
terror attacks… [Singaporeans] are being complacent when they
believe that the Government will take care of all security
matters.”
MM LEE KUAN YEW (March
2008)
—–
DEPENDENCY
MENTALITY
“This has
bred a dependency mentality in our population who will blame the
civil service and Government if any of their needs are not
met.”
MP FOR SEMBAWANG GRC, LIM WEE KIAK
(March
2008)
—–
IMMATURE, WHINY
“I don’t want whining
Singapore boys. They are not mature even though they have done
national service and are over 22 years old when they take up
undergraduate studies.”
PHILIP YEO, EX-CHAIRMAN, A-STAR
(Straits
Times, 2005)
—–
BEMOANING
“[A] well-educated
university graduate who works for a multinational company should
not be bemoaning about the Government and get on with the
challenges in life.”
MP FOR ANG MO KIO GRC, WEE SIEW KIM
(Straits
Times, 2005)
—–
DOGS
“If you can select a
population and they’re educated and they’re properly brought up,
then you don’t have to use too much of the stick because they would
already have been trained. It’s like with dogs. You train it in a
proper way from small. It will know that it’s got to leave, go
outside to pee and to defecate. No, we are not that kind of
society. We had to train adult dogs who even today deliberately
urinate in the lifts.”
MM LEE KUAN YEW (“The Man And His Ideas”, 1997)
—–
CHAMPION
GRUMBLERS
“Singaporeans are champion
grumblers.”
MM LEE KUAN YEW, (National
Geographic, Jan 2010)
—–
PROTESTING TOO MUCH, VOLUNTARILY
UNEMPLOYED
“SINGAPOREANS who complain
about foreigners taking away their jobs may be protesting too much…
[Some Singaporeans] are voluntarily unemployed.”
TAN KHEE GIAP, Associate Professor,
Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy (Straits
Times, Mar 2010)
—–
BANKRUPT
“A SEGMENT of the Malay
community has been likened to bankrupt English soccer club
Portsmouth by Senior Parliamentary Secretary (Education) Masagos
Zulkifli.”
Straits Times, Mar
2010
—–
LAZY AND TOO OLD
“I know of one family who
complain the cleaners in their precinct are lazy and too old. They
don’t want local workers who are old, they want young foreign
workers. To satisfy the demand, I changed the local workers to
foreign workers.”
ONG AH HENG, MP FOR NEE SOON CENTRAL
(Straits
Times, Mar 2010)
—–
CHOOSY
“The problem of choosy
workers is still with us.”
THEN-MINISTER OF STATE FOR MANPOWER,
NG ENG HEN (MOM,
2003)
—–
MAIDS
“Your asset values will
disappear, your apartment will be worth a fraction of what it is,
your jobs will be in peril, your security will be at risk and our
women will become maids in other people’s countries, foreign
workers.”
MM LEE KUAN YEW (Straits Times, 5
April 2007)
——–
“DAFT”
“It adds to their wealth and this is
asset-enhancing policy Mr Lee believes citizens should not find
fault with. If they do, they must be ‘daft’, he
said…”
MM LEE KUAN YEW (CNA, January
2010)
—–
“IRRESPONSIBLE”, “SPREADING
FALSEHOODS”
Dr Balakrishnan also berated
“irresponsible websites” for circulating the clip. “Now that the
facts are out, let’s see whether these people who’ve been
propagating falsehoods have the courage and honesty to set the
facts right,” he said.
VIVIAN BALAKRISHNAN, (Straits Times,
April 2010)
———–
“SMALL-MINDED”, “UNFAIR”, “VERY, VERY
SELFISH”, “UNSPORTSMENLIKE”
“To deny them [new citizens
sportsmen] to call themselves Singaporeans is very, very selfish.
It’s very unsportsmenlike…”
VIVIAN BALAKRISHNAN (Straits Times,
23 June 2010)
